Yen strength across many of its crosses has been a structural theme for the better half of the past year, but today a few of these pairs look to be setting up for some mean reversion over the short-term.

Pound / Yen remains in a downtrend below its downward sloping 200 day and made new lows in April, but momentum diverged positively. Today prices closed back above the February lows to confirm the bullish divergence and failed breakdown. This suggests we want to be long if prices remain above the February lows on a daily closing basis and add to our positions if prices close above the downtrend line from the February highs. [Read more…]

The weight of the evidence has been building in favor of the bears over the last week or two, making the US equity weakness this week anything but surprising. Throughout the duration of this post I’ll outline the evidence that I’ve been noticing over the last two weeks and what it means for us as market participants moving forward.

Yen Strength – The Yen broke out structurally late last year and hasn’t looked back since. Tactically my upside targets were hit this week, but structurally this market has a lot more room to run. Given the high negative correlation between the Yen and US equities, this should continue to be a headwind for equity markets going forward. [Read more…]

The noise surrounding the Federal Reserve is some of the silliest and biggest wastes of time in all of the financial industry. The media loves to talk about it, because well, they get paid to talk, not to help you make money in the market. Discussing the Japanese Yen for hours on end isn’t sexy. That doesn’t drive traffic or boost ratings. But if you’re here to try and make money in the market, it’s actually the most important thing to be watching here.

Long-time readers and Members of All Star Charts know how much I’ve been pounding the table about watching the Yen to gain insight on the direction of the U.S. Stock Market. Notice how last month when Yen put in its top (USD/JPY bottom), the S&P500 made its low on the very same day. The Nasdaq Composite also put in its low that day, so did the Russell2000, so did the Mid-cap 400, so did the Russell Micro-cap Index, so did the NYSE Composite. I can keep going, but I think you get the point. [Read more…]

With the Yen rallying nearly 10% from intraday low to high in as many days, this breakout is not one to be ignored. Since the Yen has a strong negative correlation with US equities, this inter-market relationship is an important one to keep track of regardless of whether you trade currencies or not.

Structurally the Yen has been trading in a seven point range at and below the 2006-2007 lows for the last 15 months. Late last year prices confirmed a failed breakdown by breaking back above the 2005 & 2007 lows, as well as the downtrend line from the 2012 highs.

Over the past two weeks prices have accelerated to the upside, providing additional confirmation that this market is headed higher. As long as prices can hold above support outlined in gray (.0082), then the weight of evidence suggests the first upside target is near the 161.8% extension of the late 2014-2016 range and prior support near .0098-.0099.

A few weeks ago global equity markets began to mean revert to the upside after many met downside targets and momentum positively diverged. For examples of this check out my posts from then here and here. The same failed breakdowns and bullish momentum divergences that sparked a rally globally are now present across many of the US sectors and indices.

Of the 41 US indices / sectors I follow, 28 of them have bullish momentum divergences on the daily charts and have either confirmed, or are working on confirming, a failed breakdown by trading back above a prior low.

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